BEIJING, Jan. 13 (Xinhua) --- The Export and Import Bank of China (Eximbank), one of China's three policy banks, reported that its ratio of non-performing loans dropped to 3.47 percent at the end of 2006.

    Information from the bank's annual working meeting held this week shows that the bank has seen a steady fall in the amount and ratio of non-performing loans (NPL) for eight years in a row since1998, with the NPL ratio down by more than 10 percent from the 14.19 percent in 1998.

    In 2006, the bank granted loans of 131.5 billion yuan (about 16.86 billion U.S. dollars), up 11 percent on the previous year. By the end of 2006, the bank's outstanding loans reached 231.7 billion yuan, while the outstanding amount of foreign government loans handled by the bank was 17.6 billion U.S. dollars.

    Eximbank president Li Ruogu said the bank will move away from solely relying on government subsidies to develop commercial business in addition to policy business, and introduce modern banking operation mechanisms.

    He said the bank will actively support the state's economic diplomacy, speed up financial innovation, support the export of services, and help promote export-oriented innovation bases and overseas economic and trade cooperative zones.